Related Resources

Keywords are the words and phrases that people type into search engines in order to find what they're looking for. By extension, they also describe what a piece of content (or an entire website!) is all about, and they're the words at the heart of on-page optimization. They still play an important role in a site's ability to rank, so by identifying the right words and phrases to target you can have an outsized impact on achieving your SEO goals.

This page is your home base for learning all about keywords and keyword research. You'll find resources here that are useful to learners of all skill levels.

Keyword Research Bootcamp

Live Online Workshop

This 2-hour class shows you how to find the best keywords and analyze your competition. Learn the best keyword research tools and SEO competitor analysis processes. There is something for everyone in this Bootcamp.

How to Build a Killer Content to Keyword Map for SEO

In this Whiteboard Friday, Rand illustrates the process of creating your own content-to-keyword map to discover where to optimize, what content to build, and how to intelligently target keywords when you're auditing a site.

Diving for Pearls: A Guide to Long-Tail Keywords

One of the biggest obstacles to driving forward your business online is being able to rank well for keywords that people are searching for. This post covers researching, assessing, and targeting long tail keywords so you can start attracting the best visitors to your site.

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How to Optimize for Competitors' Branded Keywords

In this Whiteboard Friday, Rand explains some strategic and smart ways to optimize for competitors' keywords — from determining their worthiness, to properly targeting your funnel, to using third-party hosted content for maximum amplification.

Can SEOs Stop Worrying About Keywords and Just Focus on Topics?

Should you ditch keyword targeting entirely? In this Whiteboard Friday, Rand discusses old-school keyword targeting and new-school concept targeting, outlining a plan of action you can follow to get the best of both worlds.

The Illustrated SEO Competitive Analysis Workflow

One of the most important activities for any SEO process is the initial competitive analysis - what you learn can help establish your overall strategy moving forward. Learn how to conduct a comprehensive competitive analysis in this post.

Measuring ROI in the Age of 'Not Provided': 5 Tips for Search Marketers

In this webinar, we'll guide you through advanced Google Analytics techniques that you can use today to help justify your marketing efforts, measure your search traffic, and segment your data in new ways.

Keywords to Concepts: The Lazy Web Marketer's Guide to Smart Keyword Research

Many people in the SEO space mistakenly assume that because Google withholds keyword referral data in the form of (not provided), keywords no longer matter. Nothing could be further from the truth. Read this post to learn more.

When Keyword (not provided) is 100 Percent of Organic Referrals, What Should Marketers Do?

A Visual Guide to Keyword Targeting and On-Site SEO

As the "O" in SEO has broadened in scope, the most effective elements of on-page optimization have changed. While there is arguably no "perfectly optimized page," this update to a 2009 post provides a comprehensive guide to steer you in the right direction.

How to Rank: 25 Step Master SEO Blueprint

When you are new to online marketing, the process of mastering SEO can be overwhelming. Despite the wealth of information, it’s often hard to figure out what to actually do in order to achieve search engine success. To simplify this process, we created this SEO blueprint. Think of it as an intermediate SEO instruction manual for beginners!

Strings to Things: Entities and SEO

Presented by Matthew Brown at MozCon 2013

In the last year, Google and Bing have both indicated a shift to entity-based search results as part of their evolution. Google has unscored this point with rich snippets and Knowledge Graph, and Bing has now upped the ante on personal search results with Bing Snapshots. Find out how you can adopt strategies to stay ahead of the curve in the new world of semantic search results.

International SEO and the Future of Your ROI

Presented by Aleyda Solis at MozCon 2013

Take a bold step into the international market. Aleyda will walk you through how to calculate the possible ROI of international sales, how to sell it to your boss or client, and the practical how-tos of international implementation on your site.

MozCon Video Bundle

Facing the Future: 5 Simple Tactics for 5 Scary Changes

Presented by Dr. Pete Meyers at MozCon 2017

We've seen big changes to SEO recently, from an explosion in SERP features to RankBrain to voice search. These fundamental changes to organic search marketing can be daunting, and it's hard to know where to get started. Dr. Pete will walk you through five big changes and five tactics for coping with those changes today.

I'd Rather Be Thanked Than Ranked

Presented by Wil Reynolds at MozCon 2017

Ego and assumptions led me to choose the wrong keywords for my own site. How did I spend three years optimizing my site and building links to finally crack the top three for six critical keywords, only to find out that I wasted all that time? However, in spite of targeting the wrong words, Seer grew the business. In this presentation, Will shows you the mistakes made and share with you the approaches that can help you build content that gets you thanked.

How to build an SEO-intent based framework for any business

Presented by Katie Cunningham at MozCon 2017

Everyone knows intent behind the search matters. In e-commerce, intent is somewhat easy to see. B2B or, better yet, healthcare, isn't quite as easy. Matching persona intent to keywords requires a bit more thought. In this video, we'll cover how to find intent modifiers during keyword research, how to organize those modifiers into the search funnel, and how to quickly find unique universal results at different levels of the search funnel to utilize.

Advanced Keyword Research Use Cases

How to Use Your Competition's "Top Pages" Data to Bolster Your SEO Efforts

By comparing top pages data from multiple sources against one another, you can get some really cool, powerful advanced SEO opportunities in your content and keyword targeting. Rand explains how in this Whiteboard Friday.

Are Words the New Links?

Presented by Mike Blumenthal at MozCon Local 2017

As we move towards a world of things & entities, Google has used started using non linked based signals for ranking. In several case studies we will look at factors that determine relevance and develop a model how Google might use them to determine rank.

What is a SERP feature?

What is SEO?

What is SEO all about, and why do things like keywords, on-site optimization, and links matter when it comes to improving a site's search engine visibility and ranking? Learn the basics in this article.

What Is Semantic Search and What Should You Do About It?

Keyword Research in 2016: Going Beyond Guesswork

Traditional keyword research focuses on discovery, leaving you with a pile of keywords and a lot of guesswork to prioritize them. What if there were a better way? This post explores four metrics you can use to evolve your keyword research.

How Much Keyword Repetition is Optimal?

If you're targeting a particular keyword, where and how often should you use that in the front and back ends of my page? In this Whiteboard Friday, Rand puts his recommendations into the context of today's SERPs.

Comparing new vs. old keyword difficulty scores

Parole, Parole, Parole: Practical, Modern Keyword and Topical Research

Presented by Gianluca Fiorelli at Mozcon 2015

Just using Keyword Planner and Google Suggest is a waste time. Gianluca will show you how keyword and topical research is more about culture, not guessing, and explore unusual sources and seldom used tool features to make your research more effective.

Getting Local Keyword Research and On-page Optimization Right

Presented by Mary Bowling at LocalUp 2015

Local keyword data is often difficult to find, analyze, and prioritize. Get tips, tools, and processes for zeroing in on the best terms to target when optimizing your website and directory listings, and learn how and why to structure your website around them.

Illustrated Guide to Advanced On-Page Topic Targeting for SEO

Semantic SEO for the People

Since Hummingbird was silently rolled out, semantic search has become the new black of SEO. In this webinar, you'll learn what semantic SEO is and how to implement it strategically and correctly with actionable practices.

International Keyword Research

The first step to international SEO is optimizing your keywords to the non-English searcher. Learn how to choose the right keywords for most languages without the need to become fluent in another language.

Helpful Tips for Doing SEO in a Low-Volume Niche

Harmonizing your organic, paid, and CRO efforts is key to finding success when you do SEO in a low-search volume niche. Get inspired by these tips and strategies for maximizing what you have to work with.

3 Tactics for Hyperlocal Keywords

Reaching the perfect audience is priceless, but hyperlocal keyword research is frustrating. In this Whiteboard Friday, Rand shares how to find powerful, laser-focused keywords to bring you *exactly* the customers you're looking for.

How to Uncover Hidden Keyword-Level Data Using Google Sheets

Keyword-level data isn’t gone, it’s just harder to get to. By using Google Sheets to marry the data from Search Console and Google Analytics into a sheet, you’ll have your top keywords and landing page engagement metrics together (for free!).

The Keyword + Year Content/Rankings Hack

What's the secret to earning site traffic from competitive keywords with decent search volume? The answer could be as easy as 1, 2, 3 — or more precisely, 2, 0, 1, 7. In this Whiteboard Friday, Rand lets you in on a relatively straightforward tactic that can help you compete in a tough space using very fresh content.

What We Learned From Analyzing 1.4 Million Featured Snippets

Anecdotally, SEOs have been reporting that pages that answer questions — such as who, what, when, where, and how — tend to be great at earning featured snippets. Learn if these “gut feelings” were backed by data in this study.

Targeting Multiple Keywords on a Single Page

Hummingbird Unleashed

The objective of Google's Hummingbird algorithm update was to better understand the users' intent when searching in order to offer them the most relevant results. Learn more about what that means for ranking and visibility in this post.